2025
This has been a year.
A year for many friends and dear persons—of grief, of loss, of absurdities. Like the great Trickster’s joke on us.
But wasn’t that what we said about 2024? Oh, this is the year of suffering, sorrow. Unprecedented Times. Unprecedented tragedies. Dark tales. Mourning. Grieving. Really?
I’m lying in the winter sun back home in Airdrie now, pondering about these changing narratives. Flipping through my 2025 agenda. Week by week. The blessings, the pains, the peculiar entanglement of it all. Bewildering. Enchanting. Disenchanting. Deeply, viscerally heart-shattering. Heart-wrenching. Heart-warming. Gnawing. Little notes. Little mementos, treasures, promises, photos, reminders, vows, breaking vows, broken, half-healed, tender, calloused, morphing realities.
…
So, yes, it’s been a year of goodbyes. For many of us. Loss of parents, grandparents, partners, selves. Some forever, some still torturously ongoing, some privileged even to have—because what, because we loved too much, we were loved by too much. What an absolutely silly thing when you stop to marvel at it all. Blessing-curse. Same, same.
So, yes, it’s been a year of grief. But also of so much celebration. Of new births, of many many weddings (some to the same person!), of first day at kindergarten and first day at university, of leaning on new friends and old friends, reconnecting with long-separated blood relatives, home-cooked feasts, new recipes, old recipes, unpacking, repacking, unpacking, repacking, ‘Moving to a New House’ … being stripped down to just a couple postcards and a set of watercolour pencils to call ‘home’ - and even that I lost…
Things I said goodbye to too quickly: yellow backpack, yellow minion water bottle.
But there really isn’t quite a long enough goodbye, right? “What we would give for 5 more minutes…”
And so, yes. Such is the little funny story of ‘Wanting to Start Again’. A desire for desire, perhaps, gotta be enough of something to believe in. To trust. That some moment of some day in this seemingly endless loop of repeating images, we get to notice the snow glittering in the sunlight again. That’s all.
Like sugar. Like sprinkles.
//
xoxo
Still Me
(some notes for my future self/you)
12
Let yourself
be.
Movedcherish. make space. honour your solitude. notice what you notice.
Take ownership of your story.
Be soft. Be fluffy. Be Silly. Be brave. Let melancholy visit with grace.
“Stoic romantic.”
Love is not demanding, but it is not lazy, either.
Communication takes effort. Deep listening. Deep noticing.
Tenderness and patient attention.
1
Foster relationships.
Let it be known. That we have felt. Deeply.
Continue writing.
Take care.
Dare. To be. Happy.The warm
fuzziness
of just
sitting here.
Just sit.
And exist
for a moment.
A moment. “How long is that?”Find equanimity.
Just exist.Space expands when you notice.
When all else hardens,
Find Courage to embrace
moments of
Softness.We are. The accumulation. of each bite of Pancake.
To be so grateful that you cannot stop weeping
the unbearable tenderness
How can the awareness of being love this much hurt this much.
2
“Time slowed down
To give her
the Moments she needed.”The comfort. Reassurance of being weighed down.
“Awful. Unbearable Trust.”
“Happiness is the longing for repetition.” :||
To Play. To not lose the will to Live.
“When we try to describe it, we change the memory of it.”
3
Find some way. To express it.
Could it be.
That we are actually — Finite.
That we are the sum of our parts. Pieces.
That when we share, we give away Pieces of ourselves.
And to speak, to conjure, articulate, voice — is to betray.
Betray the purity of what is inscrutable.
To never do enough justice to what is whole within us.
The infinite. Broken, broken, shrunk. “Translated.”
Lost. In translation.
But, we keep, moving. Compromising.
In search of any semblance. of “connection.”Put on something beautiful.
And carry on.Put it down.
4
Timing.
5
Reframe.
Plant notes for the future.
Loving detachment.
(but no….it’s not ‘detachment’, is it)Enchantment of small things.
Desire needs air it needs space
show up.
Unity. Individuality. Balance.
6
It’s okay.
Breathe.
You are still You.“Briefly, a delicious life.”
Trust. Respect. Commitment.
“Mystery is not about travelling to new places,
but to look with new eyes. “Together yet unique, us & ourselves. How to experience connection and separateness at the same time.
Patience with yourself.
We make our meaning.
Following the silence.Listen curiously.
“a fear of disappearing if looked directly”
I love my books. Here. I love speaking truth to myself.
7
Incantations.
ineffable— enchantment—
Protect. Preserve. Practice — your access to desire.
Stay open to the mysteries living
right next to us.Raw abandonment.
Be Silly.
I am allowed to want things.
Safe conflict.
“Love and doubt are the motivations for the work that is necessary for change.”
(and belief?)“To notice, and then ignore” judgement
You have enough.
You are enough.Kindness and intelligence. Soft and strong.
The real question: will the story work its magic on you?
I feel fulfilled.
It’s so delicious. To feed yourself Ideas. (and maybe share them with others too).
Hold love without possessing.
It’s okay to be not known.
There needs not be a reason.
Solace. Break. Surrender. Grow. Emerge. Bloom. Free.
Take time/space without feeling guilty/selfish.
Let the ball be in your court for a while.
Time makes space.
Compost heap.
Go say hello.
Be Alone.
Swiftly. Assuredly — choose.
Hold onto doing things your way. Conviction. Determination. Confidence.Renew. Rewrite. Repeat. Being able to articulate what you have learned, processed, felt.
“It seems just the right hour, again,
to be Alive.”“What cannot be remembered will be repeated”
(but will what is repeated be remembered?)
8
The past is still living.
To be still surprised. By the familiarity —
Learning is Re learning.
What not to Allow.
A pond. A field. A space of Tenderness.
The Joy of Living.
See beyond what is ‘Real’, and embrace the Invisible.
It’s a rolling hill.
Be aware— if you are anchoring yourself in your sadness.Let go.
Stick to the plan.
Stick to the plan. Baby steps.
Keep writing reminders for your future self.
9
It’s okay.
Write it down.
Remember, (feel), then let go.hello
Write. And Let Go.
“You do not have to be Good.”
What is there
and what is not
”don’t try to forget what has been damaged.”Simple.
Honour. Protect. Your Silence. Take Care. of people you love.
Keep identifying leaves.
I will not inflict on others
the pain that has been inflicted on me.
I will fortify, refortify,
but not harden my heart.
I will feel it,
and move through it.Be here. Connect.
It’s okay to linger a bit.
When to voice.
When to share.“It’s through reflecting and remembering
that we stay grateful.”Find the language to Name it.
You can still
reframe for yourself.You will also need
to forgive yourself. Accept his pain.Feel it. And move through it.
This Precious Life.
“Thank you for sharing that with me".”
”I’m so glad you told me.”Be cautious of thinking and acting our emotions without feeling them.
“The Courage to walk alongside others.
Boundaries.
Anchor in Connection.
10
I will stay soft.
I will stay open.hello
“it’s not fear that gets in the way of Courage
it’s armour.”The heart of compassion is acceptance.
touch something soft.
Feeling things.
Moving through them.
Rewriting notes.A strange and inscrutable Tenderness.
“We become what we do —
even when those things are outside of who we want to be.”Ideas have a life of their own.
Remember the feeling of Being nourished.
Really see it.
Connected to all things.
11
intention.
How we must have lived.
Honour your tolerance/love for ambiguity.
“Today I stay home to find it.”
Develop Fascination. Write it. And be altered by it.
“They wait patiently for my recognition.”
“Intentions become tangible through ritual.”
“We are more than the sum of our empirical parts and liabilities,
and more than the average of someone else’s norms.”context.
Allow multiple realities to exist.
(even if you can’t live in all of them)contextual understanding. knowing shifts in space and time.
“Our friendship
is what keeps us whole
love is essential as air
prayer contains desire
to worship is to open
the door to one’s heart
we were looking at the ceiling
and then
we saw the Sky”Never stop being astonished.
12
“It’s winter—there is purpose to what opens, closes, and to what sheds its leaves now.”
What a year.
“if I stay” (ed)
